During consumption of a beverage from a drinking vessel, such as a cup, glass, mug, open soda can, open beer can, stein, and such like, holding the vessel can sometimes be uncomfortable or otherwise problematic. If the beverage is warm or cold, the vessel can become uncomfortably warm or cold to the touch. In addition, a cold beverage can cause a drinking vessel to condense moisture on its outer surface, thereby making the vessel slippery and causing the hand of a consumer to become uncomfortably wet.
One solution to this problem is to provide a handle to facilitate grasping of a drinking vessel. For example, a reusable tea cup, coffee mug, or beer stein typically includes a handle that is permanently attached thereto. The handle provides for easy grasping of the drinking vessel without exposing a user's hand to uncomfortable temperatures or condensed moisture.
Handles are also sometimes included with disposable paper beverage cups. Typically, the handle is split into two flat halves that are initially aligned against the outer surface of the cup, so as to allow for easy stacking and storage of a plurality of cups. At time of use, the two halves are bent away from the cup and held together by the hand of a user. While providing the basic benefits of a handle, this approach can be inconvenient and uncomfortable, since the halves of the handle can be difficult to separate from the surface of the cup, and are typically uncomfortable to grasp. Also, the need to provide a handle with each disposable cup results in significant added cost, due to the extra handle pieces and gluing thereof that must be included in the manufacture of each disposable vessel. Other types of disposable drinking vessel, such as open beer and open soda cans, typically do not include a handle of any sort.
A convenient and comfortable approach for holding a drinking vessel, such as a disposable drinking vessel, that does not include a permanent handle, is to provide a reusable, detachable handle that can be attached to the drinking vessel during use, and then detached for reuse once the beverage has been consumed. One type of reusable, detachable handle includes one or more rings that can surround the drinking vessel. However, this approach can typically be used only with drinking vessels that fall within a narrow range of diameters, and are either tapered in shape or have a pronounced lip near the upper rim. Otherwise, handles of this type can slip in location, causing the drinking vessel to become unstable or even to slip away from the handle. Also, handles of this type are generally bulky in size, and therefore inconvenient to carry and store.
Another type of reusable, detachable handle includes a clamping mechanism that attaches firmly to the upper rim of a drinking vessel, and a bumper that rests against the lower side of the vessel. While this approach is compact and adaptable to a wide range of drinking vessel sizes and shapes, attachment of this style of handle to a drinking vessel can be uncertain and unreliable, especially if the vessel is made from a flexible material such as paper or thin aluminum, since the handle only grips the vessel at the rim. Also, the cost of such a handle can be high, due to the complexity of the clamping mechanism.
Yet another type of reusable, detachable handle attaches to the top and bottom of a drinking vessel. This type of handle is typically somewhat flexible, and includes shaping with notches and/or tabs at each end so as to couple with the upper and lower rims of the vessel. The handle is flexed so as to position the two ends over the upper and lower rims of the drinking vessel, and then released so as to cause the ends of the handle to press against the upper and lower rims and thereby firmly grasp the vessel. While this approach is adaptable to a wide variety of vessel shapes and diameters, each handle can be used with only a narrow range of vessel heights. Also, the handle must be at least as long as the vessel, and so tends to be somewhat bulky in size, and therefore inconvenient to carry and store